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Saturday, January 22, 2011

Punished Twice For The same Offence?

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Andy Coulson

﻿ Yesterday when being interviewed about Andy Coulson's resignation David Cameron said on camera that Coulson was"being punished twice for the same offence"! Wow! I thought when I heard those words, and I fully expected the media and the press pack to pick up on this rather odd choice of words from Cameron, seize them, and run with them. You can bet that if this was the Labour leader making such a statement, his words would have been plastered wall to wall within minutes. But no they weren't! Certainly not on "SKY NEWS" anyway, instead we were treated to a stream of reporters trying to cover up those words. Kay Burley, changed them several times by omitting the word "offence" entirely, then substituting the word "offence" for "problem", then again changing it to "alleged offence". If this wasn't bad enough we were treated to a whole stream of Sky reporters all falling over themselves to gush about Coulson, while exonerate David Cameron, we even had Sky's Adam the Tories are in my blood Bolton camping out in Downing Street waiting for the departure of Andy Coulson, when Coulson showed it was to just totally ignore Bolton and walk off to get in his car around the corner, but could old Cameron idoliser Adam Bolton leave it at that? No of course not he seized his chance to try and put himself in the running for the Coulson vacancy by shouting after Coulson as he beat a hasty retreat, something like "Sorry to see hear you leaving Mr Coulson" In his eagerness to impress, the gushing Adam Bolton stumbled over his words making himself sound even more sycophantic (if that were at all possible).

I smell Rupert Murdoch & Son the lacklustre stranger to the truth James Murdoch, all over this story, in fact the stench is overpowering and has the olfactics working overtime.

I believe that Sky news was tipped of by Coulson that he was going to resign yesterday, and in preparation, the orders came down from the top of News Corporation that all Sky News presenters and reporters had to report immediately to the "Rupert Murdoch Clinic of Journalistic Medicine", where they were all vaccinated with a gramophone needle and given triple doses of the mind altering drug with the generic name of "sycophancy". This "medication" makes the recipient gush about Andy Coulson to a stomach churning level, while completely crawling up the bum of the prime minster and at all costs never letting a chance go in which they can try to completely exonerate David Cameron of all blame. The level of this was so obvious that I hear it first produced stunned silences before copious amounts of laughter all over the country, it really was that bad.

The day after has not been much better on Sky, so we can assume that the effects of the "drugs" have some way to go before they wear off!

I do not for one minute expect that Coulson did not have a hand in advising the pm about what to say in preparation for when he is asked, so it makes those words "being punished twice for the same offence"! even more strange. In fact, as Andy Coulson is not leaving his position for a good few weeks yet, one may ask why the rush in announcing his decision? Why rush it out when the past Labour PM Tony Blair was answering questions at the Chilcott Inquiry? And why announce it when Labour had a top resignation of their own in Alan Johnson the shadow chancellor? If the PMs Media Director Andy Coulson thought his resignation would be buried in those two stories, and failed miserably to see that once he announced his resignation, he would become virtually the only story of the day/week/month, then perhaps Coulson is not as good as his job as the gushers would have us believe?

So back to those words "being punished twice for the same offence"! (they seem odder each time I read them) could they be Coulson's words? Is this his attempt to exonerate his boss Cameron and try to protect him for what is about to come out next? Is the denial of Coulson that he had nothing to do with the phone hacking, that has been religiously and copiously played from every Sky news presenters' lips about to come under close scrutiny?

The Metropolitan police, including the then assistant metropolitan Police Commissioner Andy Hayman, appear have been astonishingly lax and obstructive in this investigation, and the pile of evidence from Glen Mulcaire has been with the Met since the original case. It looks like a decision was taken to ring-fence this investigation around the Royals and for the Met to then say there was no other evidence of wrong doing has now been proven clearly wrong. There must now be a fresh inquiry into this whole affair and as I have said repeatedly in this blog, the Met must not be allowed to investigate alleged wrongdoing by the Met, this must now be carried out by an independent force. These allegations for the Met are clearly serious with far reaching effect and will go right to the heart of the Tory party and the government and News Corporation AKA father and son Rupert and James Murdoch. Questions will be asked and need to be asked about how

1) Andy Coulson resigned from the News of World and took up a position with David Cameron just six months later.
2) The former Assistant Commissioner Andy Hayman resigned his position and just weeks later was writing a column for the Times, one of Rupert Murdoch's papers.

We seem to be witnessing a formation of some kind of "Bermuda Triangle" between David Cameron and Downing Street, Rupert Murdoch's News International and the Metropolitan Police, the question is; "Who is going to disappear in the middle of it?"

How can it be believed that Andy Coulson and James Murdoch who then agreed to hundreds of thousands of pounds in payouts to private investigators, without at least asking questions about where this information was coming from and how it was being obtained? It was so obviously illegal concerning the Royals and Coulson agreed the expenses for that story, it had to be cleared with the News of the World's legal department before publication, the information was obviously gathered illegally. The papers lawyers would have had to know where it came from and how it was obtained and so would Andy Coulson, James Murdoch and Rupert Murdoch, it is absolutely inconceivable to think they did not know. So Andy Coulson must be lying! So must Rupert Murdoch and James Murdoch and where does Rebekah Brooks the chief executive of Murdoch's News International and the the personal friend of David Cameron's who he visited personally over Christmas fit in to all of this?

It seems mighty strange that in light of the recent revelations about the "closeness" of prime minister David Cameron and Brooks, that this resignation should suddenly hit the news!

Andy Coulson pretending that he cannot remember is laughable. It’s also worth noting that his entire defence was that he had ‘no recollection’ of phone hacking, so Coulson is not actually denying that he knew, just merely pretending he does not remember, could this be his defence to escape perjury charges? If it is, Coulson and Cameron for that matter, should remember in law, "ignorance is no defence". Once again this also brings into serious doubt the profundity of the Met's original inquiry.

I am also reminded of how Rupert Murdoch slunk in and out of Downing Street to visit David Cameron, just 24 hours after Cameron assumed the role of prime minister and has been a regular visitor since, his entries and exits always by the rear door. I am reminded of the meetings and interaction between David Cameron's media team and Murdoch's New International team.

Clive Goodman and Glen Mulcaire were sacrificed on the alter of Murdoch's News International, of that there is no doubt. Sacrificed to save people much higher up than they, I wonder if they were paid for it?

If Cameron, Coulson, James Murdoch, Rebekah Brooks and Rupert Murdoch thought "the plan they had hatched over the Christmas break" was going to take care of this matter, I think this morning they would have been groaning into their high class muesli!

Before this matter is done, we will be treated to the inner workings of:

Cameron's opposition and how he procured the support of Murdoch's right wing press.

Cameron's Tory led government and its dependency on News International

Murdoch's influence over the policies and political running of Britain

The metropolitan police underhand investigation of the entire matter NOT once but several times, which will clearly bring them under close scrutiny

The role of Andy Hayman the former Assistant Metropolitan Police Commissioner

Exactly how deep these phone hackings went

And without doubt Coulson's pretence of ignorance will be shown up to be the lie that it is

Once all this is done, David Cameron's government will be in tatters, it will be shown up to be formed on a lie and run on lies and broken promises.

The Coulson resignation seems likely to be the start of the affair, not the end.

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